Ganymede is the only satellite in the solar system known to have an intrinsic magnetic field. Interactions between this field and the Jovian magnetosphere are expected to funnel most of the associated impinging charged particles, which radiolytically alter surface chemistry across the Jupiter system, to Ganymede's polar regions. Using observations obtained with JWST as part of the Early Release Science program exploring the Jupiter system, we report the discovery of hydrogen peroxide, a radiolysis product of water ice, specifically constrained to the high latitudes. This detection directly implies radiolytic modification of the polar caps by precipitation of Jovian charged particles along partially open field lines within Ganymede's magnetosphere. Stark contrasts between the spatial distribution of this polar hydrogen peroxide, those of Ganymede's other radiolytic oxidants, and that of hydrogen peroxide on neighboring Europa have important implications for understanding water-ice radiolysis throughout the solar system.

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We observed Io with the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) while the satellite was in eclipse, and detected thermal emission from several volcanoes. The data were taken as part of our JWST-ERS program #1373 on 15 November 2022. Kanehekili Fluctus was exceptionally bright, and Loki Patera had most likely entered a new brightening phase. Spectra were taken with NIRSpec/IFU at a resolving power R ≈ 2,700 between 1.65 and 5.3 µm. The spectra were matched by a combination of blackbody curves that showed that the highest temperature, ∼1,200 K, for Kanehekili Fluctus originated from an area ∼0.25 km² in size, and for Loki Patera this high temperature was confined to an area of ∼0.06 km². Lower temperatures, down to 300 K, cover areas of ∼2,000 km² for Kanehekili Fluctus, and ∼5,000 km² for Loki Patera. We further detected the a¹Δ ⇒ X³Σ⁻ 1.707 µm rovibronic forbidden SO emission band complex over the southern hemisphere, which peaked at the location of Kanehekili Fluctus. This is the first time this emission has been seen above an active volcano, and suggests that the origin of such emissions is ejection of SO molecules directly from the vent in an excited state, after having been equilibrated at temperatures of ∼1,500 K below the surface, as was previously hypothesized.

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Several figures (Figures 5, 6, 8, 12, 13, 14) had the units off. This has been corrected in the versions below. This did not affect our results.(Figure Presented).

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We present mm observations constructed from Atacama Large (sub)Millimeter Array (ALMA) data of SO2, SO, and KCl when Io went from sunlight into eclipse (2018 March 20) and vice versa (2018 September 2 and 11). There is clear evidence of volcanic plumes on March 20 and September 2. The plumes distort the line profiles, causing high-velocity (≥500 m s-1) wings and red-/blueshifted shoulders in the line profiles. During eclipse ingress, the SO2 flux density dropped exponentially, and the atmosphere re-formed in a linear fashion when reemerging in sunlight, with a "post-eclipse brightening"after ~10 minutes. While both the in-eclipse decrease and in-sunlight increase in SO was more gradual than for SO2, the fact that SO decreased at all is evidence that selfreactions at the surface are important and fast, and that in-sunlight photolysis of SO2 is the dominant source of SO. Disk-integrated SO2 in-sunlight flux densities are ~2-3 times higher than in eclipse, indicative of a roughly 30%-50% contribution from volcanic sources to the atmosphere. Typical column densities and temperatures are N≈(1.5±0.3)×1016 cm-2 and T ≈ 220-320 K both in sunlight and in eclipse, while the fractional coverage of the gas is two to three times lower in eclipse than in sunlight. The low-level SO2 emissions present during eclipse may be sourced by stealth volcanism or be evidence of a layer of noncondensible gases preventing complete collapse of the SO2 atmosphere. The melt in magma chambers at different volcanoes must differ in composition to explain the absence of SO and SO2, but simultaneous presence of KCl over Ulgen Patera.

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We present observations obtained with the 10 m Keck telescopes of the forbidden SO a1Δ→X3Σ− rovibronic transition at 1.707 μm on Io while in eclipse. We show its spatial distribution at a resolution of ∼0 12 and a spectral resolution of R∼2500, as well as disk-integrated spectra at a high spectral resolution (R∼15,000). Both the spatial distribution and the spectral shape of the SO emission band vary considerably across Io and over time. In some cases the SO emissions either in the core or the wings of the emission band can be identified with volcanoes, but the largest areas of SO emissions usually do not coincide with known volcanoes. We suggest that the emissions are caused by a large number of stealth plumes, produced through the interaction of silicate melts with superheated SO2 vapor at depth. The spectra, in particular the elevated wing of the emission band near 1.69μm, and their spatial distribution strongly suggest the presence of nonlocal thermodynamic equilibrium processes in addition to the direct ejection of excited SO from the (stealth and other) volcanic vents.@en

Loki Patera is one of the most dramatically time-variable volcanic features on Io, exhibiting episodic brightening events every 1–3 years that may produce over 15% of Io's global heat flow. We observed three such brightening events with adaptive optics imaging at the Keck and Gemini N telescopes over the course of 70 nights of observation in 2013–2016. The high cadence and multi-wavelength nature of the observations provides constraints on models for activity at Loki Patera. The Matson et al. (2006) model for Loki Patera as an overturning basaltic magma sea is adapted to fit the observations of all three events. In particular, we adjust the details of the overturn progression, and modify the lava thermal properties to include dependencies on temperature and porosity, to improve the fit to the data. The preferred models find overturn front propagation velocities of 1.2–1.7 km/day, corresponding to resurfacing rates of 1500–2200 m²/s. The time intervals of 440–540 days between successive events are roughly consistent with the 540-day period calculated by Rathbun et al. (2002) for events prior to 2001. The best coverage was obtained for the 2016 brightening; model fits to this event require a lava bulk thermal conductivity of 0.55–0.75 W/m/K, with the best fit obtained for a value of ∼0.7 W/m/K and an average porosity that decreases during cooling. For all three events, the overturn front appears to propagate around the patera in the clockwise direction, opposite to what has been inferred for past brightening events. There is evidence that the overturn may be more complex than a single propagating wave, perhaps involving multiple simultaneous resurfacing waves as well as portions of the patera that are active even after the nominal bright phase has ended. The measured intensities are anomalously low when Loki Patera is viewed at high emission angles, suggestive of topographic shadowing due to a raised area or the edge of the depression in which the magma sea resides.

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We present observations of Io's Loki Patera taken with the 10-m Keck telescopes between 1998 and 2016. Adding these data to those published by Rathbun and Spencer (2006) and the Gemini data of de Kleer and de Pater (2016a, 2017) results in a database of 3.5-3.8. μm emission from Loki Patera over almost 3 decades. Data presented here contain adaptive optics (AO) observations of Io's sunlit hemisphere at wavelengths between 1.6 and 5. μm, AO observations of Io in eclipse at 2-5. μm, and non-AO observations of Io in eclipse at 1.6-12. μm. The non-AO data were taken in September of 1999, during the early phase of a brightening event that was documented by Howell et al. (2001). Dual-component Io Flow model (IFM) fits to our 1999 observations show a mostly cool lava crust over almost the entire patera floor, with a relatively small hotter component making up less than 1% of the total area, consistent with previous observations. The 30-year timeline of Loki Patera revealed that, after an apparent cessation of, or change in, brightening events in 2002, Loki Patera became active again in 2009. The more recent activity may have a slightly shorter periodicity than observed by Rathbun et al. (2002), and the direction of flow propagation appears to have reversed. Since 2009 the flow direction is in the clockwise direction, starting in the north or north-east corner and propagating along the patera towards the south-west. During the Galileo era the propagation was in the counter-clockwise direction, starting in the south-west and propagating towards the east. Both the 30-year timeline and the 1.6-12. μm spectrum that was obtained during the brightening event in 1999 agree well with Matson et al.'s (2006) overturning lava lake model, as modified by de Kleer and de Pater (2017).

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We present and analyze three-dimensional data cubes of Neptune from the OSIRIS integral-field spectrograph on the 10-m W.M. Keck II telescope, from 26 July 2009. These data have a spatial resolution of 0.035/pixel and spectral resolution of R ~3800 in the H (1.47-1.80 μm) and K (1.97-2.38 μm) broad bands. We focus our analysis on regions of Neptune's atmosphere that are near-infrared dark - that is, free of discrete bright cloud features. We use a forward model coupled to a Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithm to retrieve properties of Neptune's aerosol structure and methane profile above ~4 bar in these near-infrared dark regions.We construct a set of high signal-to-noise spectra spanning a range of viewing geometries to constrain the vertical structure of Neptune's aerosols in a cloud-free latitude band from 2-12°N. We find that Neptune's cloud opacity at these wavelengths is dominated by a compact, optically thick cloud layer with a base near 3 bar. Using the pyDISORT algorithm for the radiative transfer and assuming a Henyey-Greenstein phase function, we observe this cloud to be composed of low albedo (single scattering albedo =0.45-0.01+0.01), forward scattering (asymmetry parameter g=0.50-0.02+0.02) particles, with an assumed characteristic size of ~1μm. Above this cloud, we require an aerosol layer of smaller (~0.1μm) particles forming a vertically extended haze, which reaches from the upper troposphere (. 0.59-0.03+0.04 bar) into the stratosphere. The particles in this haze are brighter (single scattering albedo =0.91-0.05+0.06) and more isotropically scattering (asymmetry parameter g=0.24-0.03+0.02) than those in the deep cloud. When we extend our analysis to 18 cloud-free locations from 20°N to 87°S, we observe that the optical depth in aerosols above 0.5 bar decreases by a factor of 2-3 or more at mid- and high-southern latitudes relative to low latitudes.We also consider Neptune's methane (CH₄) profile, and find that our retrievals indicate a strong preference for a low methane relative humidity at pressures where methane is expected to condense. When we include in our fits a parameter for methane depletion below the CH₄ condensation pressure, our preferred solution at most locations is for a methane relative humidity below 10% near the tropopause in addition to methane depletion down to 2.0-2.5 bar. We tentatively identify a trend of lower CH₄ columns above 2.5 bar at mid- and high-southern latitudes over low latitudes, qualitatively consistent with what is found by Karkoschka and Tomasko (2011), and similar to, but weaker than, the trend observed for Uranus.

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Jupiter's moon Io is a dynamic target, exhibiting extreme and time-variable volcanic activity powered by tidal forcing from Jupiter. We have conducted a campaign of high-cadence observations of Io with the goal of characterizing its volcanic activity. Between Aug 2013 and the end of 2015, we imaged Io on 100 nights in the near-infrared with adaptive optics on the Keck and Gemini N telescopes, which resolve emission from individual volcanic hot spots. During our program, we made over 400 detections of 48 distinct hot spots, some of which were detected 30+ times. We use these observations to derive a timeline of global volcanic activity on Io, which exhibits wide variability from month to month. The timelines of thermal activity at individual volcanic centers have geophysical implications, and will permit future characterization by others. We evaluate hot spot detection limits and give a simple parameterization of the minimum detectable intensity as a function of emission angle, which can be applied to other analyses. We detected three outburst eruptions in August 2013, but no other outburst-scale events were observed in the subsequent ∼90 observations. Either the cluster of events in August 2013 was a rare occurrence, or there is a mechanism causing large events to occur closely-spaced in time. We also detected large eruptions (though not of outburst scale) within days of one another at Kurdalagon Patera and Sethlaus/Gabija Paterae in 2015. As was also seen in the Galileo dataset, the hot spots we detected can be separated into two categories based on their thermal emission: those that are persistently active for 1 year or more at moderate intensity, and those that are only briefly active, are time-variable, and often reach large intensities. A small number of hot spots in the latter category appear and subside in a matter of days, reaching particularly high intensities; although these are not bright enough to qualify as outbursts, their thermal signatures follow the same pattern, suggesting that a similar mechanism may be responsible for these events though at a smaller scale. Two eruptions seen at Kurdalagon Patera in January and April 2015 occurred simultaneously with a brightening of the neutral cloud and plasma torus which are sourced from Io's atmosphere. A plume at Kurdalagon Patera, such as was seen by New Horizons in 2007, could have been responsible for the influx of material that caused these brightenings.

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The extreme and time-variable volcanic activity on Jupiter's moon Io is the result of periodic tidal forcing. The spatial distribution of Io's surface heat flux provides an important constraint on models for tidal heat dissipation, yielding information on interior properties and on the depth at which the tidal heat is primarily dissipated. We analyze the spatial distribution of 48 hot spots based on more than 400 total hot spot detections in adaptive optics images taken on 100 nights in 2013–2015 (data presented in de Kleer and de Pater [2016] Time variability of Io's volcanic activity from near-IR adaptive optics 13 observations on 100 nights in 2013–2015). We present full surface maps of Io at multiple near-infrared wavelengths for three epochs during this time period, and show that the longitudinal distribution of hot spots has not changed significantly since the Galileo mission. We find that hot spots that are persistently active at moderate intensities tend to occur at different latitudes/longitudes than those that exhibit sudden brightening events characterized by high peak intensities and subsequent decay phases. While persistent hot spots are located primarily between ± 30°N, hot spots exhibiting bright eruption events occur primarily between 40° and 65° in both the northern and southern hemispheres. In addition, while persistent hot spots occur preferentially on the leading hemisphere, all bright eruptions were detected on the trailing hemisphere, despite the comparable longitudinal coverage of our observations to both hemispheres. A subset of the bright hot spots which are not intense enough to qualify as outburst eruptions resemble outbursts in terms of temporal evolution and spatial distribution, and may be outbursts whose peak emission went unobserved, or else scaled-down versions of the same phenomenon. A statistical analysis finds that large eruptions are more spatially clustered and occur at higher latitudes than 95% of simulated datasets that assume that eruptions occur at random and independent locations. The preferential occurrence of bright, violent eruptions at higher latitudes supports the idea that a deeper magma source supplies these events, as has been previously hypothesized. The monotonic eastward progression of bright eruptions at southern latitudes from 300° to 200°W also suggests a possible eruption triggering mechanism operating across distances of ∼500 km. A comparison to tidal heating models finds a good correspondence between recent models incorporating a partially-fluid interior (Tyler et al. [2015] Astrophys. J., 218–222). and hot spots in the leading hemisphere as well as persistent hot spots. However, hot spots on the trailing hemisphere and bright eruptions do not match these models well, corresponding better to standard deep-mantle heating models (Segatz et al. [1988] Icarus, 75, 187–206) although this match is still imperfect.

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Observations obtained with the near-infrared camera NIRC2, coupled to the adaptive optics system on the 10-m W.M. Keck II telescope on Mauna Kea, Hawaii, on 14 August 2007 revealed an active and highly-energetic eruption at Pillan at 245.2±0.7°W and 8.5±0.5°S. A one-temperature blackbody fit to the data revealed a (blackbody) temperature of 840±40K over an area of 17km², with a total power output of ~500GW. Using Davies' (Davies, A.G. [1996]. Icarus 124(1), 45-61) Io Flow Model, we find that the oldest lava present is less than 1-2h old, having cooled down from the eruption temperature of >1400K to ~710K; this young hot lava suggests that an episode of lava fountaining was underway. In addition to an examination of this eruption, we present data of the Pele and Pillan volcanoes obtained with the same instrument and telescope from 2002 through 2015. These data reveal another eruption at Pillan on UT 28 June 2010. Model fits to this eruption yield a blackbody temperature of 600-700K over an area of ~60km², radiating over 600GW. On UT 18 February 2015 an energetic eruption was captured by the InfraRed Telescope Facility (IRTF) via mutual event occultations. The eruption took place at 242.7±1°W and 12.4±1°S, i.e., in the eastern part of Pillan Patera. Subsequent observations showed a gradual decrease in the intensity of the eruption. Images obtained with the Keck telescope on 31 March and 5 May 2015 revealed that the locations of the eruption had shifted by 120-160km to the NW.In contrast to the episodicity of Pillan, Pele has been persistent, observed in every appropriate 4.7μm observation. Pele was remarkably consistent in its thermal emission from the Galileo era through February 2002, when a blackbody temperature of 940±40K and an area of 6.5km² was measured. Since that time, however, the radiant flux from what is likely a apparently large, overturning lava lake has gradually subsided over the next decade by a factor of ~4, while the location of the thermal source was moving back and forth between areas roughly ~100km to the W of the 2002 location and an area roughly ~100km to the SE of the 2002 location.

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